The OFFICIAL Unofficial Achewood Message Board
Trivial Pursuits => Sports & Leisure => Topic started by: ianmalcolm2 on December 20, 2013, 12:33:55 am
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So I am a dude of projects, and recently a dude of some spare time. Adding to this problem, I am frequently bitten by the stupid Emersonian bug which drives men to create home-made things using finicky multi-tiered processes. Recently, it was kimchi, which I have gotten pretty damn good at (ask for a recipe, I dare ya). However, the need to up the ante is rearing its ugly head, and due to circumstances, this next project of mine will be the making of hard cider.
Now I know god damn Onstad wrote a god damn article (http://www.portlandmercury.com/portland/diy-hard-cider/Content?oid=11213895) on the subject—I found it by accident, oddly enough—but of course, it's verbose and unhelpful. Being a man of research, I also assembled a pretty good directory of links, guides, and forum posts on the subject. Like all such things, though, the real nerds go into an infinite regression of tedious details and terminology which only confuses me, and I can't realistically absorb an entire brewer's curriculum in the next few weeks, which is my window of time to start this whole thing. And as always, it's more helpful to hear anecdotes and details from Real Life People™, preferably those who aren't assholes on homebrew forums that castigate you for not understanding the nuances of 'keeving'.
So to get past this bullshit to the topic question(s): Have any of you nuts ever attempted to homebrew hard cider? Did it 'work'? Do you have any tips or recommendations for an absolute fresh-faced amateur who's interested in making a small and fairly easy test-batch? Any interesting experiences with drinking other peoples' homemade cider and finding oneself suddenly 'arrested'?
Have at it.
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I suppose it's mostly like brewing beer or making mead, both of which I have done extensively. All these things can be discussed and dissected ad nauseam; experience is the ultimate arbiter of success. No matter how carefully you research the process, your first few batches will be terrible, because some detail escapes your notice and throws the timing of everything off. In mead making, this is why everyone recommends starting with small (1 gal or less) batches. In beer brewing the ratios of wort to hops makes small batches actually more difficult than larger (5-10gal) ones, so you start off making gallons of bad beer (even bad homebrew can be quite tasty though). So I say jump in, and don't get discouraged if you don't make brilliant stuff at first.
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I would like to try making kimchi.
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Kimchi is worth it. I'll warn you, though, that once you start making and enjoying your 'korean sauerkraut,' you'll feel persecuted, like you've joined a weird cult. Family, spouses, or roommates will start giving you funny looks at the dinner table, disparaging and questioning the safety of the 'weird rotten cabbage' you insist on bringing to every meal. And you will eat it at every meal. And between. The taste of kimchi is something beautiful, absolutely unique and unattainable in any other food.
Also, kimchi makes every bowel movement perfect. And I'm willing to get into recipe and technique specifics if we wanna bring the conversation in that direction.
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Okay, so the lady finished up a big thing with her work, so I am currently hammered, working this lil party's music while she and others are more intoxicated. However, I will try to accurately describe below the process for making kimchi.
Firstly, most of it is super easy. What I'm describing here is not 'traditional,' in that the full cabbage is not being pickled. Instead, what's being described here is 'mak kimchi,' meaning we're cutting it into bite-sized pieces to allow for quicker fermentation and easier consumption once the stuff is done. While easy, you'll need some specialized ingredients:
The hardest of these to find, depending on your location, will be gochujaru. The most common brands come in large sealed packages, are relatively cheap, and should look something like this:
(http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_4VGPl0Q8VgA/TOfpqSAuT2I/AAAAAAAAC5E/MgvgfkXE-ro/s400/Food%252919_8199.jpg)
I have yet to find a perfect substitute for this stuff if it's not available. Depending on how many korean grocery stores are in your neighbourhood, you may have to venture to a specialty Asian restaurant supplier, and ask for 'korean hot pepper powder'. If you're in a relatively rural area, and really in a bind, do not use chili powder or cayenne. Shit's different, and will mess up your kimchi something awful. Gochujaru is almost like smoked paprika. I would suggest aleppo pepper if you're really in a bind.
In terms of fi*sh sauce, anything will do, really, but I've found this stuff to be the the most readily available at Korean convenience places, and also the best in terms of taste and amount of salt:
(http://importfood.com/media/sasq2501.jpg)
Despite it's being 'squid brand,' it's actually anchovy-baed, which it recommended by most websites, and backed by Korean dudes I know.
If you do find yourself at a korean grocery, it's worth your time to find shrimp sauce as well. It'll be a paste made of tiny tiny shrimps, resembling this:
(http://media.maangchi.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/salted-shrimp1.jpg)
Don't be duped by similar-looking jars of dried shrimps. These should be a wet paste that's salty and near-mush. Don't worry, there will not be 'entire shrimps' in the finished product.
With those caveats out of the way, you'll need to assemble all these things:
2 or 3 nappa cabbages, depending on size.
a carrot
a bunch of green onion
1 daikon (pretty much optional, but helps. Regular radish can be easily substituted)
The aforementioned Gochujaru pepper
3 cloves of garlic
a 1-inch cube of ginger
some f*ish sauce (preferably anchovy-based, from a korean grocer, but the difference if not is negligible)
1 Onion
1/2 cup of cooked rice (preferably sticky rice, it's no big issue of you use other stuff)
1/2 a pear or apple (again, optional. Pear is better).
4 or 5 fresh oysters &/or 2 heaping tablespoons of shrimp paste (optional, but makes a positive difference)
sea salt (or kosher salt. No iodine is preferable)
Soaking the cabbage is the weirdest step. Cut off the tough bottom of the nappas, and chuck these away. After this, cut up the cabbage into large, rough pieces. Some pieces will be all white stalk, and some will be mostly leaves. This is all normal. Place this cabbage in salted water, roughly a 1-10 salt-water ratio. Making this exact is not crucial. Put your cabbage into a big mixing bowl, and pour the water on, making sure the cabbage remains submerged under the water. If some of the cabbage sticks out and remains exposed to air, stick a heavy object on top of your cabbage-piece mountain to ensure it all stays entirely submerged in the brine. Leave it in there for at least 3-4 hours, stirring it around at least a couple times throughout to ensure even brining. Overnight works too. Should look similar to this:
While this is going on, you get to make the paste: now this shit is more of an art than a science, hence the lack of exact measurements. Take around 3/4 cup of f*ish sauce with a cut up onion, your rice, the garlic and ginger, seafood, and the half pear or apple, and blend all these until they are a paste. If adding fresh oysters—which is totally recommended, and greatly enhances and 'complexifies' the flavour—shuck them at this stage, and just toss them in raw. Don't worry, you will not die, nor will you kill anybody. Put the resultant bright red slop into a bowl. After this, use a carrot peeler to make thin strips of the carrot, cut the daikon into matchstick-sized pieces, and put these directly into your paste mixture. Same with the green onion, chopped into roughly inch-long segments. Mix these into the sauce. And now, you have your basic kimchi paste. Have a gander:
(http://media.maangchi.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/mixedpaste1-590x442.jpg)
Now, once your salting period is elapsed, your cabbage should be noticeably shrunken, maybe kinda withered. Drain the brine, and wash the cabbage pieces off under the tap for quite awhile to ensure the end product doesn't have a whole lotta salt on the outside.
Now, you just toss the two—your salted cabbage and your paste—together. Pack your kimchi into some tupperware or another airtight container. No real need to sterilize. Be sure, however, to push the stuff down to fit the maximum amount in your given vessel. Eliminate any air bubbles where possible. YOU NEED TO LEAVE AT LEAST THREE INCHES OF AIR IN YOUR GIVEN CONTAINER, though. Otherwise, shit will explode. It will not be nice.
Leave your packed-up kimchi in its container(s) at room temperature for around 24 hours, then put that shit in the fridge. Leave it there for two or three weeks. Open it up every other day, though, and let the gasses out.
Over this amount of time, you will notice that more liquid will form in your kimchi. This is good. Keep pushing the kimchi down to ensure the cabbage itself is under the liquid. This ensures that no nasty moulds will form, and that the lactobacillus bacteria will do their work.
After around two weeks, try the stuff. It should be sour and slightly effervescent, with none of the individual ingredients being noticeable or overwhelming. Instead, it should have an intense umami flavour with a lot of saltiness and some sourness. It should taste divine. If you can eat it on its own, you've done well. Shit should look something like this, likely with more red liquid:
(http://media.maangchi.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/homemade-kimchi1.jpg)
N.B. that it will smell BAD. However, once you've first tried a good well-fermented batch of kimchi, you'll not notice the scent. Instead, it will signal to you that your precious beautiful batch of cabbage is ready to eat and be enjoyed. Another relatively important thing to do when you're in the process of eating/using the stuff, is pack it down under the liquid when you're done eating it. It'll store in the fridge for months, maturing and getting better with time, but you risk allowing weird moulds and mildews to form if you leave too much of the finished product exposed to air inside the container. keep the stuff tightly packed, and the liquid which comes with proper fermentation will do the job is keeping it unexposed to air, and the nasty free-floating yeasts and moulds therein.
Sorry for the huge puke of words, but it's a food I really feel passionately about, and even super-old kimchi is excellent (even recommended) for use in soups and other korean recipes. If you try this and are successful, please hit me up for more. I'll gladly talk for way too long on the subject.
[edits involved more pictures, greater ingredient specificity, and a decrease in the length of salting time. Some websites say and hour and a half is fine, but batches of experience tell me to do no less than three hours. Five or more is optimal. It'll be soggy-looking and stinky in the bowl, but the increased time will result in crunchier 'chi in the long term.]
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good kimchi stays with you for a couple days.
bad kimchi stays longer.
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I had what I thought to be 'bad' kimchi once. I let it sit for another 2 weeks, and it was suddenly wonderful kimchi. I guess the key is to be appropriately adventurous, leave most of the work up to the tiny invisible organisms, and to know that none of this stuff will kill you. The worst thing you can do, as long as the salting is done right, is gross yourself out a lil bit.
Also it is currently 3:19am where I am now, and it's weird to know i can be semi-coherent when the lady is downstairs, having drank a third of my total alcohol volume, blathering about being 'a hammered lil biddy.' Maybe I'm just more of a trooper than was anticipated.
Enjoy your 'chi, though.
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I have been buying kimchi, so I have 2 big glass jars. I have been using them to brew coffee into, but I think I know my next project.
(kimchi.)
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I have a number of big Korean grocery stores in the area. I dig the idea of making your own kimchi, but I'd just as soon buy it from them.
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I don't have anything to add here other than the fact that I frequent the local asian grocery store. I can go to chinatown all day long, but THE SUPER FOOD INTERNATIONAL U.S.A. off route 35 is a trip to another dimension. No one speaks fluent english. There is an area next the deli with 4 tables that is entirely occupied by people furiously scratching off scratch offs. There is a "Pharmacy" with unmarked bottles available for purchase if you know what you're asking for. I was there with my friend the other day and I asked for the package with the most holograms (it was chinese viagra) while my friend asked for the box with the cock on it (it was something for menstrual pains). The butchers section is similarly unmarked and there is any kind of meat. That store offers way more questions than answers. I'll just be here drinking a juice that contains an actual bird's nest. I can taste the bird's nest.
(http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QovykP0YKYU/Uf5P7sC7CoI/AAAAAAAAALE/AnWOJq3F2hI/s1600/P8041719.JPG)
Flavored fungus.
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I have a number of big Korean grocery stores in the area. I dig the idea of making your own kimchi, but I'd just as soon buy it from them.
I agree, but these kids today, they are really into fermenting things. I suppose it keeps them out of trouble.
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I can only thank past kids who were into fermenting things. They helped invent all the edible stuff I really like.
Plus, one might argue that homemade kimchi tastes 'better' than the store-bought stuff.
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Plus, one might argue that homemade kimchi tastes 'better' than the store-bought stuff.
Well, true. But there's store-bought stuff that comes in a jar that came from who knows where, and there's store-bought stuff that people are actually making in the store, like right there in front of you. The latter, I expect, is almost exactly like what I'd make at home.
One of my ideas for a show on Food Network would be "Ethnic Markets of America" (I'd welcome suggestions on a better name). Every week we'd go to a different ethnic grocery store, talk to the proprietor about what we're looking for, then cook dishes with what we bought there. I would very much like to go to the big display of various pickled vegetables at the Korean market and ask "Just what is going on here?" I suspect it's sort of a kimchi salad bar, pick and choose what you want to chuck in there, but if I don't know they probably aren't going to tell me.
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Oh man, you're lucky to find yourself in a place where Korean people are making that stuff themselves. They are, after all, the experts. I have no such luxury here, and any kimchi I can buy at the tiny korean convenience store in my city is the weird, too-fizzy stuff filled with dodgy preservatives.
And I would totally watch that show and its ensuing spin-off, 'BAFFLING MEAT MARKET'
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oh man don't let the food network get ahold of that one, guy fieri would just turn it into a bunch of bullshit. the esquire network might treat it a bit better, considering their current slate of shows is actually pretty good, with many of them slickly produced.
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Well, true. But there's store-bought stuff that comes in a jar that came from who knows where, and there's store-bought stuff that people are actually making in the store, like right there in front of you. The latter, I expect, is almost exactly like what I'd make at home.
I think professional Koreans would probably make it better than I would at home, so as long as I am fortunate to live near a bunch, I will leave it to them.
I would also watch that show, repeatedly.
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Hmm, we've got lots of Vietnamese here, but I'll bet there are some Koreans as well. And we totally have grocery stores like the one A-Cap described. The meat market is totally bonkers. I think I may need to go Kimchi shopping.
oh man don't let the food network get ahold of that one, guy fieri would just turn it into a bunch of bullshit.
Word!
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Hmm, we've got lots of Vietnamese here
Then you should be eating lots of pho and banh mi.
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Then you should be eating lots of pho and banh mi.
Definitely! We talked about this (http://www.flickr.com/photos/20698962@N00/6974484304/).
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It's kimchi season again. 10 pounds this year, and that doesn't include the radish stuff, and the hot pepper-less 'white kimchi'.
Something about the ritual and/or long amounts of time involved in making kimchi usually results in me gettin all tippled on beverages. But the feeling of drunk self-satisfaction when you're done beats all else.
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It's nice to have annual rituals such as this.